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BOOKS AND LETTERS FROM THE LIBRARY OF ANTHONY POWELL
Lot 342

WILDE (OSCAR)
The Sphinx, ONE OF 25 DE LUXE LARGE PAPER COPIES, Elkin Matthews and John Lane, and Copeland and Day, 1894

24 June 2015, 11:00 BST
London, Knightsbridge

Sold for £18,125 inc. premium

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WILDE (OSCAR)

The Sphinx, ONE OF 25 DE LUXE LARGE PAPER COPIES, printed in green, red and black, 10 large illustrations and other decorations by Charles Ricketts, tissue guard between title and first page of text (as called for by Mason), publisher's pictorial vellum gilt designed by Ricketts, signed with his initials and those of the binder Henry Leighton's on covers, yapp edges, ties [Mason 362], 4to (258 x 188mm.), Elkin Matthews and John Lane, and Copeland and Day, 1894

Footnotes

ONE OF 25 LARGE PAPER COPIES. The Sphinx is the first book over which Charles Ricketts had complete control, from the illustrations to the layout to the binding design. The Sphinx "is his best book... No illustrated book was ever more thoroughly planned... The result is a perfect whole, as harmonious as it is dazzling" (Ray, The Illustrator and the Book, 1976, no. 262).




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